How Liberty Was Proclaimed

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Nov 26, 1908

How Liberty Was Proclaimed

ELDER H. J. LOEBSACK, of South Russia, tells how the glad news of the granting of religious liberty was carried through that empire:—

“It caused universal rejoicing. For three days the telegraphic message assuring religious liberty to one hundred twenty-five million people in Russia was duplicated and communicated to the people. Pastors of all churches, without reference to their nationality or their creed, read the message to their congregations, and civil officers proclaimed the glad news from the rostrum and from the stump. This act was hailed as a greater boon than the granting of freedom to the serfs by Alexander II, in the year 1861.

“The news went before us into the colonies on the Volga, so that, where we formerly had to baptize by night, and hold our meetings behind barred doors and closed windows, we now assemble freely in the open air, as many as five hundred witnessing our baptismal scenes—and that without any disturbance.

“We have had similar experiences among the Cossacks. The proclamation of freedom of conscience was read in the various Cossack villages. Where, in former times, our workers had to enter the Cossack villages in the national costume, that they might not be detected and put in prison; and where they had to sleep by day, and work by night, with the room so protected that no glare of light might escape to the outside,—where all this was necessary a few years ago, we were able to hold our meetings in broad daylight, with open doors and windows; and no one disturbed us. There were various beliefs represented in the gathering,—while Orthodox Greek Catholics, Old Believers, Baptists, and six or seven Gipsies, who had never heard a sermon in their lives,—and neither priest nor policeman attempted to disturb us. This has been so among the Cossacks since the promulgation of the czar’s manifesto granting to all his subjects full liberty of conscience. We thank God for the freedom he has given us. Let all remember Russia in their prayers.”